16 Losses Under Al Groh. A Retrospective

Do you wanna know why we are 15-16 in our last 31 games? These stats tell a large part of that story:

In our 16 Losses under Al Groh, consider these awful 4th Q stats:

We have been outscored in the 4th Quarter of these losses 149-69
In 43% of these losses (6), we have given up 14 or more points in the 4th Quarter
We only held our opponents scoreless in the 4th Quarter in 2 of these 16 losses
In 9 of these 16 losses, we gave up 30 or more points in the game

Now let's compare Groh to Wommack in some categories:

Scoring Defense
Wommack: 22.55
Groh: 27.16

Total Defense:
Wommack: 336.92
Groh: 387.31

3rd Down Efficiency
Wommack: 39.57%
Groh: 43.05%

Turnovers Gained
Wommack: 27.5/yr
Groh:17.67/yr

Giving up 20 or more pts
Wommack: 62.96% of games
Groh: 81.25%

30 or more pts
Wommack: 29.63%
Groh: 34.38%

40 or more pts
Wommack:7.41%
Groh: 15.63%

I could go on and on and on with horrendous stats for Al Groh. Add in the fact that we statistically have one of the best offenses in the country and you can see where our problems lie. I truly believe sending Groh packing might be the best thing to happen at GT Football for a while to come. You really can't overstate how poor we were on defense under his control.

I am looking forward to the rest of this season and I am excited to see what next season brings us as well.

It's a good thing that the final score only counts 4th quarter points. The 33 points we average for the rest of the game are just warm up points.

When every game is within your grasp in the 4th qtr and your offense dies, it matters. You don't get to quit just because you think you've already done enough. There is no "first team to 33 points wins"'rule.

When every game is within your grasp in the 4th qtr and your offense dies, it matters. You don't get to quit just because you think you've already done enough. There is no "first team to 33 points wins"'rule.

Agreed. But if we're prioritizing, we ask why every game's simply "within our grasp" when we've scored 33 and not "in the bag," as it is for every other team that puts up that many points.

We need to get better in the 4th quarter.

But, again, let me ask:

If we scored fewer points in the first three quarters and 'made up for those' to equal our current point production level by scoring more in the 4th, would you feel like we've gained something? Like a moral victory? If we scored all 31 of our points against Clemson in the 4th, and still lost by 16, what have we gained?

If we had an offense you liked watching more, would you spend most of your time talking about a top-25 offense's deficiencies and not the bottom 15/20 defense?

I have a feeling that you wouldn't be decrying the LSU generic multiple offense from an Xs and Os standpoint, or probably fixating on it at all, if it was producing a similar number of points here as what we've got now, even in the 4th quarter.

Of course, if we're NOT prioritizing and our goal is simply to complain about an offense because we don't like the way it looks and we ignore the fact that this offense is putting up enough points to win games with a defense that is merely "bad" instead of "terrible" and we set up a tautological non-argument as our main counter to statistics : "It's simply true that if another team scored more points than us, our offense didn't score enough points" ... then we don't need to worry about comparing offensive production with defensive production.

because then we'd never have to look critically at the defense. If we lost a game 100-99, it'd be on the offense for not scoring 101. And we could focus on something we find aesthetically displeasing. Just like if we called Lucas Cox and Preston Lyons and Zach Laskey "FCS talent" and complained about their production at BB, but never lodged similar complaints about certain other BBs whose production looked about the same.

Do you wanna know why we are 15-16 in our last 31 games? These stats tell a large part of that story:

In our 16 Losses under Al Groh, consider these awful 4th Q stats:

We have been outscored in the 4th Quarter of these losses 149-69
In 43% of these losses (6), we have given up 14 or more points in the 4th Quarter
We only held our opponents scoreless in the 4th Quarter in 2 of these 16 losses
In 9 of these 16 losses, we gave up 30 or more points in the game

Now let's compare Groh to Wommack in some categories:

Scoring Defense
Wommack: 22.55
Groh: 27.16

Total Defense:
Wommack: 336.92
Groh: 387.31

3rd Down Efficiency
Wommack: 39.57%
Groh: 43.05%

Turnovers Gained
Wommack: 27.5/yr
Groh:17.67/yr

Giving up 20 or more pts
Wommack: 62.96% of games
Groh: 81.25%

30 or more pts
Wommack: 29.63%
Groh: 34.38%

40 or more pts
Wommack:7.41%
Groh: 15.63%

I could go on and on and on with horrendous stats for Al Groh. Add in the fact that we statistically have one of the best offenses in the country and you can see where our problems lie. I truly believe sending Groh packing might be the best thing to happen at GT Football for a while to come. You really can't overstate how poor we were on defense under his control.

I am looking forward to the rest of this season and I am excited to see what next season brings us as well.

Not dismissing all your hard work out of hand, but it is apples and oranges to a certain degree. Wommack looks better statistically, because our offense was performing better--performing better because we had better players and our scheme still had the element of surprise against most of our opponents. The comparison is interesting, but, the opponents were different, our defensive scheme was different and as the seasons rolled on, Paul Johnson's offense was "being figured out" and defended better. I don't disagree that sending Al Groh away was necessary, but, the program overall has been and is still being downgraded. Are you suggesting that we re-hire Wommack? Contemporaneous to Wommack's tenure the commonly held opinion was that his poor defense had kept us out of the National Championship discussions. And. . . . . if Groh was sooooooo horrendous, why was he kept for 2-plus seasons? You have to examine the decision-making process with the organization and how we evaluate our own performance. Something does not pass the smell test.

Do/did people actually think we are/were close to a National Championship?

Yes in 2009 with a decent defense, Georgia and Miami MIGHT have gone a different way. Yes, that kind of talk is just so much BS, but we were 10-1 going into our last game. That is closer than 6-7 or even 8-5.

Not dismissing all your hard work out of hand, but it is apples and oranges to a certain degree. Wommack looks better statistically, because our offense was performing better--performing better because we had better players and our scheme still had the element of surprise against most of our opponents. The comparison is interesting, but, the opponents were different, our defensive scheme was different and as the seasons rolled on, Paul Johnson's offense was "being figured out" and defended better. I don't disagree that sending Al Groh away was necessary, but, the program overall has been and is still being downgraded. Are you suggesting that we re-hire Wommack? Contemporaneous to Wommack's tenure the commonly held opinion was that his poor defense had kept us out of the National Championship discussions. And. . . . . if Groh was sooooooo horrendous, why was he kept for 2-plus seasons? You have to examine the decision-making process with the organization and how we evaluate our own performance. Something does not pass the smell test.

First of all, you are not correct that our offense was better. Our offensive stats are better from 2010-Present than they were in 2008-2009. In reference to Wommack, i'm just pointing out that we were WORSE on defense under Groh than we were under the guy we fired in 2009. It just shows what a slight improvement in defense can do to our W-L record.

Top 25 offense against some of the worst defenses in the nation, literally. Is 30 something points vs the #100 something rushing D really impressive?

But to answer your question, I'd be down on any offense that repeatedly failed to make drives to win games late. You have to make plays when plays need to be made. The D vs Miami failed just as miserably in the 4th as the offense did. Neither one did their job when the game hung in the balance.

First of all, you are not correct that our offense was better. Our offensive stats are better from 2010-Present than they were in 2008-2009. In reference to Wommack, i'm just pointing out that we were WORSE on defense under Groh than we were under the guy we fired in 2009. It just shows what a slight improvement in defense can do to our W-L record.

I submit the last 2 seasons saw an increase in garbage-time points, while we performed better in 08-09 against better teams like UGA. Stats don't always tell the entire story.

Yes in 2009 with a decent defense, Georgia and Miami MIGHT have gone a different way. Yes, that kind of talk is just so much BS, but we were 10-1 going into our last game. That is closer than 6-7 or even 8-5.

True, 2009 was a pretty good team. Not sure we could've won a National Championship with a top-25 D though.

First of all, you are not correct that our offense was better. Our offensive stats are better from 2010-Present than they were in 2008-2009. In reference to Wommack, i'm just pointing out that we were WORSE on defense under Groh than we were under the guy we fired in 2009. It just shows what a slight improvement in defense can do to our W-L record.

Is that a joke? You are telling me that if you could choose between 2009 offense and this year's offense, you would choose 2012?